revolution

The action of social revolution and the reaction of guarding against such revolution or combating it once it has begun are the causes of a great deal of the human misery with which history is permeated.

Poppe, once a leading figure at a scientific research institute, found a job as a swimming pool attendant

She saw and marked the revolutions that had been, and the present seemed to her only a point of rest, from which time was to renew his flight.

The following is a fictionalized and utterly false account of the events that most definitely did not happen on June 9-10, 1967. And yet, while all the characters in this story are little green men and women running around inside my head, the events that served as inspiration, the historical facts, as it were, must be considered no less than a sibling of the tale contained in these pages: the story I didn't write, but could have written--the book this could have been, but isn't.

We often fear that the Revolution needed is too big for what we can give.Too much change is required inside, outside.And we are too small.But all that is required is that you step into the truth of your life. And speak it, write it, paint it, dance it.That you shine your light on your truth, for the world to see.And as hundreds, then thousands, then millions do this _ each sparking the courage of yet more _ Suddenly we have a world alight with truth.

Already we know almost literally nothing about the Revolution and the years before the Revolution. Every record has been destroyed or falsified, every book has been rewritten, every picture has been repainted, every statue and street and building has been renamed, every date has been altered. History has stopped. Nothing exists except in an endless present in which the Party is always right.

The collapse of communism and a recognition of its economic and humanitarian catastrophes took the romance out of revolutionary violence and cast doubt on the wisdom of redistributing wealth at the point of a gun.

Right now, we are in a peak cycle. There__ tremendous energy out there, directed against the state. It__ not all focused, but it__ there, and it__ building. Maybe this will be sufficient to accomplish what we must accomplish over the fairly short run. We__l see, and we can certainly hope that this is the case. But perhaps not. We must be prepared to wage a long struggle. If this is the case then we__l probably see a different cycle, one in which the revolutionary energy of the people seems to have dispersed, run out of steam. But _ and this is important- such cycles are deceptive. Things appear to be at low ebb, but actually what__ happening is a period of regroupment, a period in which we step back and learn from the mistakes made during the preceding cycle.

History reminds us that revolutions are not events, so much that they__e processes _ that for tens of thousands of years, people have been making decisions that irrevocably shaped the world that we live in today; just as today, we are making subtle, irrevocable decisions that people of the future will remember as revolutions.

Unjust social orders do no fall merely by appeals to the consciences of the oppressor, though such appeals may be an important element; history teaches us that they fall because a large enough number of people organize a movement powerful enough to push them down. Rarely do such revolutions emerge in a neat and morally pristine process.

Most of the mess that is called history comes about because kings and presidents cannot be satisfied with a nice chicken and a good loaf of bread.

We have it in our power to begin the world over again.

LEFTISTS EAT THEIR CHILDREN: The poets, artists, and radicals are murdered first once the "revolution" actually comes about.

In some way, every creative action disturbs the universe.

Nevertheless, what was made in the hope of transforming the world need not be rejected because it failed to do so _ otherwise, one would also have to throw out a good deal of the greatest painting and poetry of the nineteenth century. An objective political failure can still work as a model of intellectual affirmation or dissent.

What does one prefer? An art that struggles to change the social contract, but fails? Or one that seeks to please and amuse, and succeeds?

By being natural and sincere, one often can create revolutions without having sought them.

Unity is a great thing and a great slogan. But what the workers_ cause needs is the unity of Marxists, not unity between Marxists, and opponents and distorters of Marxism.